Leigh Harline
| birth_place = Salt Lake City, Utah | death_date = | death_place = Long Beach, California | origin = Salt Lake City, Utah | instrument = | genre = | occupation = Composer | years_active = | label = | associated_acts = | website = }} Leigh Adrian Harline (March 26, 1907 – December 10, 1969) was an American film composer and songwriter. He was known for his "musical sophistication that was uniquely 'Harline-esque' by weaving rich tapestries of mood-setting underscores and penning memorable melodies for animated shorts and features." Biography Leigh Harline was born March 26, 1907, in Salt Lake City, Utah, the youngest of 13 children, to soldier Carl Härlin and his wife Johanna Matilda. His parents came from the village of Härfsta in Simtuna parish, Sweden. They joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in 1888 and moved to Salt Lake City, Utah, in 1891. In the U.S. they changed their surname to Harline.sv:Leigh Harline Leigh was baptized a member of the LDS Church at age eight.http://www.ldsfilm.com/ar/lds_composers_article.html Harline graduated from the University of Utah and studied piano and organ with Mormon Tabernacle Choir conductor J. Spencer Cornwall. In 1928, he moved to California and worked at radio stations in San Francisco and Los Angeles as a composer, conductor, arranger, instrumentalist, singer and announcer. In 1931, he provided music for the first transcontinental radio broadcast to originate from the West Coast. He was then hired by Walt Disney where he scored more than 50 tunes, including for the Silly Symphonies cartoon series in the 1930s. Harline, Frank Churchill and Paul Smith then scored Disney's first animated feature-length cartoon Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937. Snow White contained several classic songs by Churchill and lyricist Larry Morey, including "I'm Wishing", "Whistle While You Work", "Heigh-Ho" and "Some Day My Prince Will Come." Harline re-teamed with Smith again and conductor Oliver Wallace (the composer who made no screen credit before making his first score and credit appearance on Dumbo in 1941) to compose the score for Pinocchio for Disney in 1940. He also wrote most of the movie's songs with lyricist Ned Washington. The film won the three the Academy Award for Best Original Music Score and won both Harline and Washington the Academy Award for Best Original Song for the song "When You Wish Upon a Star" The song went on to be featured on Disney's opening logo since 1985 and serve as the official theme song of the Walt Disney Company. Harline left Disney in 1941 to compose for other studios. His credits include Road to Utopia (1945), Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House (1948), The Desert Rats (1953), The Enemy Below (1957), Ten North Frederick (1958), Warlock (1959), The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm (1962), The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters (1963) and 7 Faces of Dr. Lao (1964). He died from complications of throat cancer on December 10, 1969, in Long Beach, California, and is buried in Valhalla Memorial Park Cemetery. Selected filmography *''The Goddess of Spring'' (1934) *''Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs'' (1937) *''Pinocchio'' (1940) *''Mr. Bug Goes to Town'' (1941) *''Johnny Come Lately'' (1943) *''Road to Utopia'' (1945) *''Nocturne'' (1946) *''The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer'' (1947) *''The Boy with Green Hair'' (1948) *''Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House'' (1948) *''It Happens Every Spring'' (1949) *''The Big Steal'' (1949) *''Monkey Business'' (1952) *''Pickup on South Street'' (1953) *''The Desert Rats'' (1953) *''Broken Lance'' (1954) *''House of Bamboo'' (1955) *''The Last Frontier'' (1955) *''Good Morning, Miss Dove'' (1955) *''23 Paces to Baker Street'' (1956) *''The True Story of Jesse James'' (1957) *''Perry Mason (TV series)'' (1957) *''The Wayward Bus'' (1957) *''The Enemy Below'' (1957) *''Ten North Frederick'' (1958) *''Man of the West'' (1958) *''The Remarkable Mr. Pennypacker'' (1959) *''Warlock'' (1959) *''Visit to a Small Planet'' (1960) *''The Honeymoon Machine'' (1961) *''The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm'' (1962) *''The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters (TV series)'' (1963) *''7 Faces of Dr. Lao'' (1963) *''Strange Bedfellows'' (1965) Sources *[http://animationwhoandwhere.blogspot.com/2007_03_01_archive.html A Century of Animation] (includes photo) *[http://disney.go.com/disneyinsider/history/legends/leigh-harline Disney Legends] *[http://www.ldsfilm.com/lds_composers.html LDS Film Composers] References External links * * *Finding Aid for Leigh Harline papers, Archives and Rare Books Library, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio }} Category:1907 births Category:1969 deaths Category:20th-century American composers Category:American film score composers Category:American male composers Category:Latter Day Saints from Utah Category:Best Original Music Score Academy Award winners Category:Best Original Song Academy Award-winning songwriters Category:Burials at Valhalla Memorial Park Cemetery Category:Deaths from cancer in California Category:Male film score composers Category:Musicians from Salt Lake City Category:Songwriters from Utah Category:University of Utah alumni Category:American people of Swedish descent Category:Animation composers Category:Walt Disney Animation Studios people Category:20th-century male musicians